Within two weeks after her first surgery, Ana Rodarte looks in the mirror for the first time and is pleased with the large amounts of tumor that were removed by Dr. Munish Batra's team of doctors at his Del Mar office. Batra also removed the sutures and staples and reassured her that the swelling was typical after such procedures and only temporary. Ana's facial tumors were similar to the Elephant Man's. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times / April 5, 2009)​

By the time Ana turned 22, the tumor on her face had grown so large it covered her left eye. "I struggled a lot with reading. I had to deal with a lot of headaches," she says. "It became really hard to eat. When I would chew on the left side of my face, it would result in me biting into it."

At 24, Ana met a surgeon who gave her new hopeDr. Munish Batra. "When I looked at her for the first time, I was completely just amazed that she hadn't had [more] help up until this time," he says. "As surgeons, we know that there's a lot we can do for this."

With Ana's consent, Dr. Batra and a team of surgeons at Scripps Memorial Hospital in La Jolla, California, began a series of riskyand ultimately successfulsurgeries to remove the 2-pound tumor from her face. "There's a chance that they may progress [in the future]," he says. "But at this stage, it seems less likely because she's been at a fairly stable growth phase."